Thirty years ago today, with belly bulging, a twenty…something…year-old me loaded her toddler daughter into a champagne-colored van to go have dinner with Dad. He worked evenings at the Plano Star Courier, putting together the newspapers that would go out the following day.

After a lovely time with Dad, as I drove back home, I was a bit distraught. The next morning, we would be heading to the hospital to have our second child.

My first child’s birth had been difficult, ending in a last-minute C-section after 24 hours of induced labor. Our financial situation had been very different then.

Five months into that first pregnancy, I lost my job and health insurance and had to go on Medicaid. Which meant transferring prenatal care to the hospital’s clinic and seeing whatever doctor was there for the day. When our due date came around with no labor pains, I was sent home to wait it out. I know, I know. Births of first pregnancies, at least according to the medical wisdom of the time, were often late. Two weeks later, I still hadn’t gone into labor, and the amniotic fluid around the baby had begun to…let’s call it evaporate. So we were induced. For 24 hours. With very little progress. (Did I mention we went in on Christmas Eve?) I had always been a very healthy person. Never had surgery. Horror stories of recovery after surgery rang in my head, and the last thing I wanted was a Caesarean on Christmas morning. But that’s what happened. Turns out the umbilical cord was wrapped around our little girl’s neck three times. No wonder she didn’t want to come out.

Fast forward two years and five months. May 24, 1995. All of that was in my mind as I drove home from the Plano Star Courier. I began to cry. Back then, I listened almost exclusively to a Dallas Christian radio station. In the middle of my crisis, melodramatically wondering if my baby and I would be alive by that time the next day, a song came on. Kathy Troccoli’s “My Life Is in Your Hands.” I’m sure the title tells you all you need to know.

The following day, a much calmer me went to the hospital. We had to be induced again, but we weren’t two weeks late. We had insurance this time with the same doctor caring for me throughout the gestational period. Most importantly, I had the assurance of God’s hand on me, come what may.

About twelve hours after being induced, I gave birth to Shannon Elizabeth. No complications. No C-section. And thirty years later, I’m still here to tell the story. 🙂 And what a blessing that baby has been in our lives. She has grown into an incredible young woman whom I am so very proud of.

Sorry for giving away your age, but happy “Birthday Eve,” Shannon.